Clegg no-show exposes UK coalition rift
Tensions over Europe at the heart of the British coalition government were exposed today, as Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg failed to attend the House of Commons to hear David Cameron defend his decision to veto last week’s proposed EU treaty.
The Liberal Democrat leader said that he did not want to provide a “distraction” by appearing in his usual place at the Prime Minister’s side as Mr Cameron told MPs that he had taken “the right course for this country” at the Brussels summit.
But his absence was branded “cowardice” by one Conservative MP, and Mr Cameron’s statement was repeatedly interrupted by Labour shouts of “Where’s Nick?”.
Mr Clegg was later forced to insist that the coalition was “here to stay” until 2015, despite confirming that he and the Conservative Prime Minister “clearly do not agree on the outcome of the summit”.
A senior Labour source branded the Lib Dem leader’s no-show “spineless”, telling reporters: “The Commons chamber is the place where you debate issues and air your differences – you don’t hide outside.”
And Labour’s foreign affairs spokesman Douglas Alexander issued an appeal to disgruntled Lib Dem MPs to join the opposition party in trying to win back friends and allies in Europe and prevent Britain’s “marginalisation”.
Mr Cameron was given a rousing reception by eurosceptics on his own benches, who hailed him for standing up for UK interests at last week’s European Council meeting in Brussels.
He told MPs that he had negotiated in “good faith”, but was forced to block a treaty of all 27 member states after other EU countries refused to agree to “modest, reasonable and relevant” safeguards for the City of London.
“We went seeking a deal at 27 and I responded to the German and French proposal for treaty change in good faith, genuinely looking to reach agreement at the level of the whole of the European Union,” he said.
“The choice was a treaty without proper safeguards or no treaty and the right answer was no treaty. It was not an easy thing to do, but it was the right thing to do.”
But Labour leader Ed Miliband accused Mr Cameron of neglecting the national interest in order to appease Conservative eurosceptics with a result that was “bad for business, bad for jobs, bad for Britain”.
In noisy exchanges which required several interventions from the Speaker, Mr Miliband quoted Mr Clegg several times in his dismissal of the Prime Minister’s claims for the summit.
“How can you expect to persuade anyone else it’s a good outcome when you can’t persuade your own deputy?”, he said.
It was not a veto “when the thing you wanted to stop goes ahead without you”, he added.
“That’s called losing, that’s called being defeated, that’s called letting Britain down.”
Branding the outcome of the summit a “diplomatic disaster” for the UK, Mr Miliband accused Mr Cameron of “walking away” from talks instead of negotiating a better deal for Britain.
But Mr Cameron responded by demanding whether Mr Miliband would have signed up to the proposed treaty, which was designed to provide a new “fiscal compact” to impose budgetary discipline on the 17 eurozone states.
“If you can’t decide, you can’t lead,” Mr Cameron told the Labour leader.
A source close to Mr Miliband later said: “We wouldn’t have signed the treaty, but we would have stayed in the negotiation and signed a better deal. Blair or Thatcher would have extended the talks. Any other Prime Minister would have extended them.”
Conservative MPs were loud in their congratulations for Mr Cameron.
Backbencher Andrew Rosindell applauded him for “displaying the bulldog spirit in Brussels”, while former minister John Redwood said Britain’s negotiating position was stronger because other European states now know “they are dealing with a Prime Minister who will say ’No’ if he needs to”.
But Mr Cameron was quick to close down suggestions that last week’s veto should be followed by a referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU.
“Our membership of the EU is vital to our national interests,” said Mr Cameron. “We are a trading nation and we need the single market for trade, investment and jobs.”
Liberal Democrat MPs, some of whom voiced dismay at the EU veto over the weekend, were more muted in the Commons debate.
Jo Swinson, a parliamentary aide to Business Secretary Vince Cable, compared Mr Cameron’s negotiating strategy unfavourably with Chris Huhne’s efforts at the Durban climate change talks.
Mr Clegg himself said in his TV interview: “The Prime Minister and I clearly do not agree on the outcome of the summit last week.
“I have made it very clear that I think isolation in Europe, where we are one against 26, is potentially a bad thing for jobs, a bad thing for growth and a bad thing for the livelihoods of millions of people in this country.”
But Conservative MP Nadine Dorries accused the Liberal Democrats of “cowardly and negative attacks”.
It was, she said, “cowardice only to be surpassed by the absence of the Deputy Prime Minister in the Chamber today”.
Meanwhile, Downing Street indicated that the UK was ready to “engage constructively” with the other 26 EU states on the issue of whether institutions like the European Commission and European Court of Justice can be used to support the new inter-governmental agreement struck last week.
Britain is concerned about the potential for conflicts of interest if the institutions are asked to “serve two masters” by using their resources, officials and buildings to work for the group of 26 as well as the full 27-member EU which they were established to support, said a spokesman.
